Thursday, August 18, 2016

Thursday Movie Picks - Crime Gone Wrong

Written as part of the weekly blogathon hosted by Wandering Through the Shelves. Join in the fun by picking three movies that fit the week's theme and telling us a bit about them!
Well, what a week to forget what day it was last night! "Crime Gone Wrong" is the theme for this week, and my first thought this morning as I logged into my email and sat and stared in shock horror at the day of the week and proceeded to Wanderer's sight to get the theme was "....doesn't that describe MOST crime movies?" I'm sure it doesn't, but having to think quickly before the work day technically starts and I have to jump on a conference call it certainly felt that way! Because where's the drama if the crime doesn't go wrong? AH, but there are OH SO MANY WAYS a crime can go wrong that each film feels so different. Let's start with...

Four Lions (Christopher Morris, 2010) ...incompetency. You wouldn't think it would be possible to make a comedy about terrorism in the post-9/11 world, but leave it to Brit genius Chris Morris to prove you wrong. Four Lions is about a group of British jihadists who probably couldn't find their way out of a paper bag if they had to, let alone carry off a massive-scale bombing. The film is deeply, DEEPLY funny despite being about such a nauseating subject, but doesn't completely shy away from that nauseating aspect either, and therein lies its genius. It also features Riz Ahmed, so if you're really enjoying The Night Of, you definitely owe it to yourself to check this out.

Reservoir Dogs (Quentin Tarantino, 1992) Well, what doesn't go wrong with this crime? Although it probably all starts with the undercover cop right in the middle of the merry band of pop-culturally savvy robbers. Tarantino's first film features nearly all the stylistic flourishes he would return to and refine over the years: a gleefully anarchic pop soundtrack, chapter divisions, deliriously smart and quotable dialogue, tension-building long takes, and of course, bursts of hard-to-stomach violence. It almost feels like he arrived fully formed as a filmmaker, except we know he only got better and better from here on out.

Les Diaboliques (Henri-Georges Clouzot, 1955) Moving on now to that other old chestnut, "the dead body that may not be so dead after all." Christine and Nicole are the wife and mistress, respectively, of the headmaster of a second-rate boarding school. He treats both women awfully, in addition to the children, so the women conspire to murder him. Except when the body doesn't stay where they left it to be found by the police. And what follows is a film so perfectly taut and thrilling that no less a personage than Alfred Hitchcock was jealous of it. So jealous of it, in fact, that he pre-bought the movie rights to the next book by the authors of the book that inspired this movie, before it was even written. Which turned out to be a pretty good thing, because that movie turned out to be his masterpiece: Vertigo.

19 comments:

Four Lions sounds great and I have to see this film...it looks like a brilliant satire. I am sadly stating I have yet to see Reservoir Dogs and it is popular today along with Fargo. I LOVE Les Diaboliques! What a great film...Simone Signoret is both sweet and really sour in this film. I also like Vera Clouzot and am surprised how young she was when she died of a heart attack.

Diabolique is a genius pick! Love that movie, it's easy to see why Hitchcock was so impressed with it. Both Signoret and Clouzot fit their roles perfectly. I'd like to say I didn't chose it because I'd used it before, which I have, but honestly it didn't cross my mind and I'm kicking myself because it fits perfectly.

The Sharon Stone/Isabelle Adjani remake is blah and not a patch on this but have you ever seen the 70's remake retitled Reflections of Murder with Joan Hackett (in the Vera Clouzet role) Tuesday Weld (taking the Signoret part) and an especially vile Sam Waterston as the husband? It's really excellent, moving the story to America but remaining true to the original without being slavish and both actresses are fantastic. The whole film is on YouTube, I highly recommend it.

I watched Reservoir Dogs for the first time earlier this year and while I didn't flat out adore it I did think it was a well put together movie.

Haven't seen Four Lions, I'll have to check it out.

That's a good point about crime films almost without exception involving something that goes wrong. That does give them a punch and I usually enjoy them making it easy to pick three. These are what I came up with.

One False Move (1992)-After a series of drug deals go bad and result in several murders a trio of gangsters take it on the lam ending up in the small Arkansas town of Star City. On their trail are two LAPD detectives who team with the small town sheriff (Bill Paxton) to capture the three. Bracing, violent thriller excellently directed by Carl Franklin. Co-written by Billy Bob Thornton who plays one of the criminals.

He Ran All the Way (1951)-Petty thief Nick Robey (John Garfield) teams up with his buddy Al to pull what they plan to be their big score, a payroll robbery. But they are foiled by a cop who shoots Al, panicked Nick shoots the cop. On the run he ducks into a public pool house and strikes up a conversation with a young girl named Peggy (Shelley Winters). Smitten Peggy walks home with him and he takes her family hostage until the tense finale. Low budget, taut noir was the blacklisted Garfield’s last film before his too early death at 39.

Criss Cross (1949)-Armored car driver Steve Thompson (Burt Lancaster) is still carrying a torch for his ex-wife Anna (Yvonne de Carlo) who is now married to a L. A. gangster, Slim Dundee (Dan Duryea). Anna impulsive and restless is drawn to him as well and when Slim catches them together he forces Steve to participate in a robbery on the cars he drives. It does not go well and a series of double crosses lead to tragedy for all. If you only know Yvonne de Carlo from The Munsters this is the best place to see she was not only an incredibly beautiful woman but an excellent actress as well.

UGH on the Stone/Adjani remake of Diabolique. Just wrong in practically every conceivable way. I've heard of Reflections of Murder (and apparently there was another one for TV with Melissa Gilbert?!?) but have not seen it. Tuesday Weld had quite the interesting career... I LOVE Sam Waterston so I'll seek it out.

I've seen none of your picks but Criss Cross seems like pick of the litter. I LOVE Yvonne de Carlo.

Half-Pint in any production of Diabolique just makes me sad. I don't hate her or anything but she's never displayed any sort of spark that would indicate she could handle either of those women with assurity.

About Me

Performer since birth, tap dancer since the age of 10. Life-long book-lover. Film obsessive. Frustrated artist since college graduation. Non-profit database specialist by day, tap teacher by night, Netflix binge-watcher by weekend.